The external HDD should be fine, usually anything that says it's compatible with Vista is also compatible with 7.

Does this error occur when you load/attempt to load a program, when you first log onto Windows, or something else?
Just need to establish whether it is a background process or application you load at the time.

Also what software have you installed recently, say the last week or so?

It seems to just randomly happen. Once I restart the comp it usually happens within 10 minutes or less for the first time. But I wouldn't say it always happens as soon as I restart and log in every time. Sometimes its probably within 2 minutes, but others it may take longer. I have noticed that once my comp has been on for awhile (hours/days) it doesn't seem to happen very often, but it might happen randomly 4 or 5 times before it seems to stop.

The only thing I have discovered that makes the error ALWAYS occur, is attempting to install my HP printer again. The error pops up multiple times and then the printer says it couldn't install properly.

A few days before Christmas I had some malware/virus try to lock me out of my comp. I restarted in safe mode and did a system restore to a few days before that. That seemed to work fine, except this is when I started noticing the error message. After running Avast! and MalwareBytes, which both show up clean, the error was still occurring. Now I decided to do a system restore for Dec. 5th. This was the oldest restore point I had, and it was from before I installed my printer. After this new restore the error still occured, but my printer did not work properly. I uninstalled the printer (which took several attempts on account of the error message interrupting the uninstall). Now when I try to re-install it I run into the problem I mentioned above.

It looks like I installed "Adobe Flash Player 11 ActiveX" on 12-22-12, and "Skype Click to Call" on 12-22-12. Those are the only two things that would have been from around the same time the problem started occurring. However I can't say for sure whether or not the problem started before, during, or on that date.

By the sounds of it I wouldn't be surprised if there is some bits of the printer software/drivers left, download RevoUninstaller (free version) from here - http://www.revouninstaller.com/revo_uninstaller_free_download.html
And uninstall the printer stuff (if shown) and also to be sure uninstall the Adobe Flash and Skype add-on you mentioned, try that first.

As for the virus/malware, I'm not an expert but I don't think a system restore would have removed the virus (or at least not entirely), I'll get one of the malware guys here to have a look and go through with you to make sure there isn't anything left.

I removed the Adobe Flash and Skype add-on. There is nothing on there for Hewlett Packard though. I haven't seen the error message since, but my comp has been on all day and as I said earlier the message is much less frequent the longer it stays on; unless I try to install my printer which causes multiple errors every time. Should I just restart now and try to re-install the printer?

Also, I noticed that I have 4 previous versions of Microsoft Visual C++ installed. All from 2008. Should I take those off and see if that helps?

As for the virus/malware, I was using Internet Explorer (I know, I know) instead of Google Chrome which is what I normally use. I've noticed when I use IE that Avast tells me its blocking attacks on my comp all the time. But when I use Google Chrome this seems to never happen. Anyway, the virus/malware pops up and takes over my entire screen. It says its the US Department of Justice and my comp is being locked down for "illegal activity" and I have to go to Walmart, buy MoneyPak, and give them $300 in the next 48 hours or they will prosecute me. Lol, I guess they are hoping someone actually doing something illegal will be scared enough not to question it and just pay up. I had seen this once before and using a system restore solved the problem just fine. It did this time too, except for this error message I keep getting. Also, I ran an Avast scan afterwards, got a hit and sent it to chest. Now however, all scans come back clean.

" data-author="DSTM" data-cid="172050" data-time="1357638229
I'm pretty sure that you have Malware on your machine. I will send a message to our malware experts to look into it for you. Please be patient until they have looked at your thread.

Error - 1/7/2013 7:08:52 PM | Computer Name = Eddie-PC | Source = Service Control Manager | ID = 7032
Description = The Service Control Manager tried to take a corrective action (Restart
the service) after the unexpected termination of the Print Spooler service, but
this action failed with the following error: %%1056

<span style="color:#008000; P2P Warning
Please note that as long as you're using any form of Peer-to-Peer networking ( Frostwire, Limewire, Bit Torrent etc.) and downloading files from non-documented sources, you can expect infestations of malware to occur.
Once upon a time, P2P file sharing was fairly safe. That is no longer true.
P2P programmes form a direct conduit onto your computer, their security measures are easily circumvented, and Malware writers are increasingly exploiting them to spread their wares onto your computer. Further to that, if your P2P programme is not configured correctly you may be sharing more files than you realise. There have been cases where people's Passwords, Address Books and other personal, private, and financial details have been exposed to the file sharing network by a badly configured programme.

Many of the programmes come bundled with other unwanted programmes, but even the ones free of any bundled software are not safe to use.
When you use them you are downloading software from an unknown source directly onto your computer, bypassing your Firewall and Anti-Virus software. Hardly surprising then that many of these Downloads are being targeted to carry infections.

You may decide to continue P2P sharing, but keep in mind that this practice may be the source of future malware infestation.
If we clean your computer of infection, and you return to us a short time later with an infection contracted by the use of P2P programmes, we may refuse to help you.

If you do decide (unwisely) to keep these programs, please refrain from using them until we have finished cleaning your system.

I see you installed Erunt today.
Did you see this note on the Prep guide page:

Note *:
The automatic backup won't work with Vista or W7. You may receive error messages related to ERUNT on boot as it attempts to automatically backup. Please backup manually using ERUNT with the following instructions:
<ul class="bbc Please locate the ERUNT icon on the desktop. If it is not there, click Start and type ERUNT into the search box.
Right click the ERUNT icon in the desktop or the Start menu, and select Run as Administrator
Click OK at the first message box.
Ensure the checkboxes for both "system registry" and "current user registry" are checked. Leave the default save location in there.
Click OK .
Click Yes to create the new folder.
You'll get a window saying "registry backup complete" once it's done. Click OK .

Click to expand...

So because Erunt is in the startup section of the OTL report..... you may get an error about Erunt when starting your system.

<span style="color:#008000; Step 1
Double click on OTL to run it.
Copy the lines in the codebox below. (make sure that :Otl is on the first line )

[IMG]http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v708/starbuck50/runfixbutton.png" alt="runfixbutton.png
OTL will reboot your system once the fix has completed.
After the reboot, you may need to double click OTL to launch the program and retrieve the log.
[b] Copy and paste the contents of the OTL log that comes up after the fix in your next reply[/b] .

[b] if you lose the report, there will be a copy here[/b] :
C:\_OTL\[b] MovedFiles[/b]

[b] <span style="color:#008000; Step 2[/b]
[b] <span style="color:#FF0000; Your Java is out of date.[/b] Older versions have vulnerabilities that malware can use to infect your system. A malicious site could render Java content under older, vulnerable versions of Sun's software if the user has not removed them. [b] Please follow these steps to remove older version Java components and update[/b] :
<ul class="bbc Download the latest version of [b] [url=http://java.sun.com/javase/downloads/index.jsp <span style="color:#0000FF; Java Runtime Environment (JRE) 7 Update 10[url][/b] and save it to your desktop.
Scroll down to where it says "[b] Java SE 7 Update 10[/b] ".
Click the "[b] Download JRE[/b] " button to the right.
Accept the license agreement.
select [b] 'Windows x64'[/b] from the list.
Save the file to your desktop.
Close any programs you may have running - especially your web browser.
Go to Start > Settings > Control Panel, double-click on [b] [url=http://www.bleepingcomputer.com/forums/topic42133.html <span style="color:#0000FF; Add/Remove Programs[url][/b] and remove all older versions of Java.
Check ([b] highlight[/b] ) any item with Java Runtime Environment (JRE or J2SE) in the name.
Click the [b] Remove[/b] or [b] Change/Remove[/b] button.
Repeat as many times as necessary to remove each Java versions.
Reboot your computer once all Java components are removed.
Then from your desktop double-click on [b] jre-7u10-windows-i586-p.exe[/b] to install the newest version.

I responded a few hours ago, came back to check on the thread and my post is gone, and this entire site looks like it just underwent a remodel or something.... weird. Also, your links have disappeared and are showing up like this: < a href="http://java.sun.com/javase/downloads/index.jsp < span style="color:#0000FF; Java Runtime Environment (JRE) 7 Update 10< /a>. Not sure if this is a problem on my end or not, but everything was fine a few hours ago. OK, so let me try this again. First, I read the Erunt note and ran the program per the instructions. You are right, upon restarting my comp after the OTL scan it did give me an error message. Should I remove it from my startup section?

As far as Java is concerned there are two "Windows x64" files to choose from. One is "jre-7u10-windows-x64.exe" and the other is "jre-7u10-windows-x64.tar.gz". I assume its the first one but I'll wait for you to respond before I update Java. Also, there are no files called " jre-7u10-windows-i586-p.exe" available to download. There are a few files with "i586" in the name, but they are for Windows x86 or other operating systems.

Just a quick update on the C++ error message. As soon as my system rebooted after the OTL scan I received the C++ error message. It then popped up 2 more times over the next couple of minutes.

Files\Folders moved on Reboot...
File move failed. D:\Setup.exe scheduled to be moved on reboot.
C:\Users\Eddie\AppData\Local\Temp\FXSAPIDebugLogFile.txt moved successfully.
File move failed. C:\Windows\temp\_avast_\Webshlock.txt scheduled to be moved on reboot.

Ok Starbuck, I updated Java and installed the correct Microsoft Visual C++ Redistributable Package. I then did a restart just to see if having the right C++ package would fix the problem, but I'm still getting the error message.

As far as the 'Clean Boot' goes, here's what I did. First, I opened 'msconfig' and under the 'services' tab I clicked on the box 'Hide all Microsoft Services'. This only left 8 items but I unchecked all of them and did a restart. The error message still occurred on restart. Next, I decided to start un-checking the Microsoft Services to see if I could isolate it that way. I noticed one called 'Interactive Services Detection', which is what the error message window says at the top so I decided to only un-check that one and see what happened. Well, this stopped the error message from showing up, but I still couldn't install my printer. I'm assuming this is because I had simply disabled the service that told me there was a problem and didn't actually disable the service that was causing the problem. Am I correct in that line of thinking? Or is 'Interactive Services Detection' even a legitimate Microsoft service? I've never seen any kind of error from it until now. But anyway thats what I did. So in the end I never actually disabled ALL of the Microsoft services. I was a little hesitant because I was under the impression it could crash the system. Hope this helped!

I noticed one called 'Interactive Services Detection', which is what the error message window says at the top so I decided to only un-check that one and see what happened. Well, this stopped the error message from showing up, but I still couldn't install my printer. I'm assuming this is because I had simply disabled the service that told me there was a problem and didn't actually disable the service that was causing the problem. Am I correct in that line of thinking? Or is 'Interactive Services Detection' even a legitimate Microsoft service?

Click to expand...

Yes the 'Interactive Services Detection' is a legit Microsoft service.
Basically it let's you know if there are problems with the system.
It can be disabled.... If you disable this service, you will no longer receive the notification for the problem service. Also, you will not receive notification for any misbehaving service on your system.
There is more information here, if you want to read it:http://blogs.msdn.com/b/patricka/ar...eshooting-interactive-services-detection.aspx
This isn't really within my field, but i will have a look around and see if i can find out any more information for you.
As far as trying to reinstall the printer.....
I did find some printer entries still in the OTL report.
Also there was an entry which had been stopped using MSCONFIG.
These may have contributed to you not being able to reinstall the software.
Also the HP folder was still on your system:

C:\Windows\Hewlett-Packard folder moved successfully.

Click to expand...

Those entries have since been removed with the Otl fix.
It may be worth trying the reinstall again.
There's no guarantee it will work..... but we have nothing to lose.
Just check that the software/drivers you install are 64bit compatible.

Btw:
Just an after thought.
Do you have the win7 operating disc?
if so we could run a System File Check.
If SFC discovers that a critical system file has been damaged, altered or missing, it restores the correct version.
Just to make sure that the Interactive Services Detection has no errors.

This computer was a custom build by a friend of mine back in 2008. He put Windows 7 Beta on it to begin with, and once the real version of Windows 7 was available I bought and downloaded it. So I'm pretty sure I never had a win7 operating disc.

Yes the 'Interactive Services Detection' is a legit Microsoft service.
Basically it let's you know if there are problems with the system.
It can be disabled.... If you disable this service, you will no longer receive the notification for the problem service. Also, you will not receive notification for any misbehaving service on your system.

Click to expand...

So basically disabling the service won't really fix the problem. I guess I'll try to reinstall the printer, but if the error message prevents me from doing so I will disable 'Interactive Services Detection' and try to install again. It didn't work last time I tried that, but now that OTL has removed the rest of the HP files, maybe it will. I'll post my results.

At this point do you still believe this is a Malware issue? I ask because I've never had a problem with Malware on this comp, learned my lesson in the past. Yes, I have bitTorrent installed but I'm smart about how I use it and don't just go downloading everything from everyone on the web (By the way, per your request, I have not used it since you started helping me). Just curious if you think its malware related or if its related to the HP software or something else. Thanks!

It may... but the downside is that you won't get any notifications of any system problems.
So it's a very last resort measure.

Just curious if you think its malware related or if its related to the HP software or something else.

Click to expand...

No i'm not convinced it's a malware issue now.
The type of FBI malware you originally had has been removed.
I've cleaned this malware from a number of systems and have never seen this type of error before.
So i don't think it's related.
I have found a lot of posts on the 'net' about people with the same type of problem.... but no definite answers.
Also quite a few people posting with this problem after installing HP software.
Have you asked HP about the problem?

Although i'm not convinced that it's malware related, i'm quite prepared to dig deeper with other programs we have just to make absolutely sure.
It's entirely up to you.

To answer this earlier question:

I read the Erunt note and ran the program per the instructions. You are right, upon restarting my comp after the OTL scan it did give me an error message. Should I remove it from my startup section?